We continue our gentle tour of the insects. There can’t be many people who don’t know something about bees and wasps. One makes honey and is a friend, one is only interested in stinging you to death. Well, just maybe there’s a bit more to it than that.
First, here’s a link (below) to an article by an expert in the arts of helping people, especially children, to get to know nature and natural things. Why does this matter, she asks.
There was a survey conducted in 2008 in the UK by the National Trust, a heritage and conservation charity, that found 50% of children couldn’t tell the difference between a bee and a wasp. This statistic did the rounds, being quoted in all the newspaper articles about nature and children and what can be done about it all. But I don’t think adults reading these articles truly asked the question of themselves. Because children’s ignorance wouldn’t exist if the adults around them had this knowledge to teach them.
Thankfully, ID exercises that reduce nature to Latin names and tiny differences in antennae don’t matter, so while this is sad and poignant—decades ago, this knowledge would have been commonplace—the world has changed, and we must accept it.
The above extract is taken from this article. I encourage you to read it, it’s not long but its message matters:
On which theme - Jane Goodall died a few days ago and her sayings have been widely shared as a result. This is relevant to the above:
“Only if we understand, will we care. Only if we care, will we help. Only if we help, shall they be saved.”
Even if you can tell a bee from a wasp, did you know that are many, many different species of Hymenoptera, the taxonomic group to which both belong. At least 100 have been reported just in the region where I live, undoubtedly though there are many more not reported. The world is awash with these insects.
The total number of described Hymenoptera species is second only to the Coleoptera (Beetles) that I introduced a few weeks ago. Hymenoptera can almost always be recognized by the presence of a narrow “waist.” The group includes many species that have developed a social or colonial lifestyle - think of the Honey Bee hives for example. Ovipositors of Hymenoptera tend to be well developed and have sometimes become modified into a stinger in some species. Because the “stinger” of such forms has developed from the ovipositor of females, only females can sting. Not all species can or do sting.
Many species of Hymenoptera are extremely small and are thus difficult to identify even to family level. A new species of tiny wasp first recorded in 1997 turns out to be tiniest existing insect on earth. I mention this because I realized it was quite common for people to assume that these tiny insects are all just “flies”. Another distinguishing feature is that perhaps a majority of bee and wasp species dow not live in colonies/nests but live quite solitary lives, going about their business quietly and calmly.
The most familiar species, as you would expect, is the Honeybee (Apis mellifera), which is not a native north American species of insect having been brought to this continent from Europe. When people talk about declines in pollinators it is almost always the Honey Bee of which they are thinking, despite there being many, many more species of insects from a wide range of groups that are equally important as pollinators. Equally, the Honey Bee is one of the few colonial species, the majority of bees being solitary in habit.
When I lived in England I had several hives of Honey Bees under some apple trees at the bottom of my garden. Looking after them was one of the highlights of my life and the honey was worth all the effort and occasional sting. Mostly, the stings were not too bad - with the exception of one in my forehead received the day before we were to drive to France on vacation. The morning we left one eye was closed by the swelling, which would have caused a problem for most people but as I am effectively blind in that eye anyway we just happily drove off to catch the ferry. A couple of days later I was back to normal.
The second large groups of Hymenoptera are Wasps and Hornets. Sawflies are also a group of wasps that are noteworthy because they have no “waist” that is present in all other Hymenoptera. Tiny parasitic wasps are one of the most beneficial groups of insects, reducing populations of pest species.
Lastly, there are the Ants with something in the region of 8,000 species in the world, albeit there is nothing like that variety here. We will deal with them another week.
And so - what have observers found in my study area, as an example? Just short of 100 species in fact and many of them happily pottering around the flowers in our own gardens, doing pollination duties.
For example, I have found records of around ten species of Halictidae or Sweat Bees. These are often quite colourful bees, many being golden or green and a metallic green at that. They are small and solitary species that nest in the soil, their primary food being pollens. As a group they are declining in numbers because of agricultural practices and loss of habitat, especially for making their underground nesting chambers. The most frequently encountered member of this group, at least in my garden, is the Orange-legged Furrow Bee (Halictus rubicundus). This is not one of the more colourful species but it does, as its common name suggests, have orange legs and is quite catholic in its range of chosen flowers as it seems to appear on almost anything you care to look at.
Also, easy to observe are the Sphecidae or Mud-dauber Wasp. Again, solitary bees that construct nests lined with mud into which they will place a paralyzed insect or spider and lay eggs from which the larvae emerge and feed on the fresh meat prepared for them. Some nests will be in holes in the soil while others are inside burrows made in plant stems etc. If you have a garden pond with some mud around it you will not have to wait long until you are visited by one of these creatures - for example Chalybion californicum, the Common Blue Mud-dauber Wasp or one of the several species of the genus Sceliphron, or Black Mud-dauber Wasps which like to stock their larders with paralysed small spiders.
What about Yellowjackets? What indeed, perhaps these are sadly the most reviled of insects yet they really are not out to get you. In fact they are highly beneficial in our environment. For a start, they provide effective pest control, being voracious predators, hunting down various garden pests that might otherwise wreak havoc on your plants. Just one colony (so long as you now where it is) can significantly reduce harmful insect populations, without the use of chemical pesticides. Unexpected allies in the backyard. They are important pollinators and also play a role as natural “sanitation workers” in that they quickly dispose of dead insects, rotting fruit, and animal remains.
“But they sting !” Well yes, they can, but only when they are disturbed or threatened by external sources. To minimize conflicts, note that the combination of a large, mature colony, in late summer with a shift toward sugary foods, reduced natural forage, and heightened reproductive activity makes this the period when wasps are most likely to intersect with human activities—and thus become a nuisance. If you’re dealing with them, minimizing exposed food, keeping trash sealed, and removing or relocating nests early in the season can help reduce those late‑summer encounters. And … don’t flap your hands.
The following photographs were all taken in our garden - so they are easy to find if you are interested.
The last picture above, possibly Therion circumflexum, is a splendid little insect. It is an Ichneumon Wasp species - adult females search out caterpillar hosts using both tactile and olfactory cues. She uses her antennae to feel the surface to determine that the integument is wrinkled with no patches of setae present, which indicate an appropriate host, if I have the ID right that would be various moth species, on which she will lay eggs, often accompanied by a dose of venom. Other Ichneumon Wasps, of which there are at least 25,000 ion the world, will parasitise other species The hatched larvae feed on the caterpillar, concentrating on the non-essential parts of its host, keeping it alive by leaving the vital organs for last. Without ichneumons, it has been said, the world would be overrun by caterpillars. Adults feed on nectar, sap, and water, some species also eat pollen.
Next week: Dragonflies and Mayflies.
Gradually we are nearing the end of insect appreciation. Dragonflies and Mayflies next week, then rounding off with Grasshoppers and Crickets. By the end of October we will have started on plants (unless appeals from readers ask me to go elsewhere) which is looking rather as if Beans and Roses will get us nicely started.
Great tutorial. I grew up some 80 years ago in rural upstate New York. We had a large garden, and a few fruit trees, from which we had fresh produce in season, and Mother canned and preserved the rest for winter. There and in the surrounding fields and woods, I learned to know and love the natural world.
Now, at 85, I live in an urban apartment, and seldom get the luxury of a country ramble. But your great videos need my continual thirst to know more. And I hope they reach city kids with the wonders of the natural world.
Many thanks!!
Great post. I learned about Therion circumflexum today. Thank you! Very interesting.